Tuesday, October 21, 2014

We moved into this house just over a year ago. Since then we've been trying to decide how to set up the yard. We've met with contractors, worked with a landscape architect and priced different things. We've gone from "that's way too expensive" to "we should just do it and be done" and then back and forth again and again. We always seem to come back to the "just do it" side of the fence and last week we did.

When we moved in, the yard looked like this.

Then we had the trees removed because they weren't doing anything in terms of privacy, they dropped a shit-ton of needles and several were beginning to lean towards the house. Once the trees were gone, it looked like this.

And now that we've made a decision that will either be an incredible amount of fun, a maintenance nightmare, or both...the yard looks like this.

The pool will open in the spring of 2015. That dirt in the back will end up being patio around the wood oven I've been daydreaming about off and on for a decade.

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

A good sized crowd gathered at Shmaltz Brewing for the finals. Both Marino's and DeFazio's brought two pizzas for the crowd and judges to eat. Both shops also took the Finals seriously and sent some great pizzas to Clifton Park. Their challenge: 1 vegetable pizza and 1 meat pizza.

The judges went for the vegetable pizzas first. Marino's sent in a pizza topped with sauteed green pepper and mushrooms. Defazio's sent in a smoked mozzarella pizza with red peppers and red onions.

Marino's Vegetable Pizza
This was the warmest slice we ate. The crust was nicely browned and had good color. It had gotten a little tough in transport from Schenectady to Clifton Park but nothing serious. The sauce was good, not as amazing as the sauce on their Margherita, and I thought the pizza could have used a little bit more of the sauce. Maybe they held back to avoid potential sogginess during shipping. The toppings were sauteed before going on the pizza. I thought the white button mushrooms were delicious. While I'm not a fan of green peppers, this is usually the only way I like them - sauteed down so they lose their bitterness. The cheese on the slice had a nice flavor too. A very enjoyable slice.

DeFazio's Vegetable Pizza
The crust on this pizza was delicious. I don't know what they did differently, but I thought this was the best DeFazio's crust I've had that spent time in a take-out box. It was nicely browned and tender. Just the right bit of char. Wow. The sauce is the shops regular pizza sauce, which was added for the Finals - this pizza is usually white. The flavors of the toppings worked well together - smoked mozzarella, small bits of red onion and some roasted red pepper. Up to this point, I believe that this is the best slice of pizza I have had in the Tournament.

Marino's Meat Pizza
Marino's went with a lot of meat. Pepperoni, meatball, sausage. The crust was a little lighter than the vegetable slice I had and still had good flavor but was a little chewy. They still have a good sauce and again there could have been a little more. But on the flip side, some more could have definitely soaked into the crust during transit. Their pepperoni was the same zippy pepperoni that was on their spicy pizza in the semi finals. Sausage was still excellent. I thought the meatballs were good, but not great. All in all, a very good meat lovers pie.

DeFazio's Meat Pizza
DeFazio's brought a Bolognese pizza. The crust was topped with their Bolognese sauce (slow cooked pork and veal with little bits of pancetta) topped with cheese and then a little bit of crumbled sausage on top. The crust was pretty much the same as their vegetable pizza just slightly darker - delicious. I thought the sauce was well flavored but I thought the wine taste on the finish was a little off. All of the meat was excellent.

Pre-Results Wrap Up
In a damn close decision, I gave the edge to DeFazio's 40 to 38. The crust was the difference for me. I brought the family to the finals. Allison thought the DeFazio's vegetable pizza and the Marino's meat were the best two pizza. If she were picking a slice from the two of those, she went with DeFazio's Vegetable. Casey would pick the same two pizzas also with a preference to DeFazio's. Amy concurred picking those two pizza's as her favorites. When asked which one she would go to for another slice she said, "There, I would have gone for the DeFazio's red pepper one because I couldn't believe how much I liked it. Right now, I think I'd go with the Marino's meat lovers."

Really, really close call. I'm not sure how the other judges scored it but I think DeFazio's narrowly won the veggie round and Marino's narrowly won the meat round. It will all come down to the margin of victory in each round. I'm writing this before the results are posted so we'll see if I'm right. The All Over Albany write up of the event is here.

The Results Have Been Posted Wrap Up
Well, the results are now up at All Over Albany. The People's Choice title went to Marino's meat pizza that barely beat DeFazio's veggie pie, 73 to 72.5. The judges narrowly gave the Tournament Title to DeFazio's 167 to 164. That's really close. If you combine the pizza scores from the People's Choice, the people also gave the title to Defazio's 144.1 to 138.6. So it looks like I was mostly right, DeFazio's won the veggie round, Marino's won the meat round and it all came down to margin of victory. Anyhow, I've talked about pizza at work enough so our holiday party will be pizza trips to DeFazio's and Marino's.

The End of the Pizza Tournament
I was absolutely thrilled to be part of the Tournament. As a long time fan (I came up with an over/under and a points spread for last year's finals) it was a lot of fun to participate. It was even fun getting interviewed by some Saint Rose students covering the finals for a class. I learned a lot about pizza along the way. I knew eating it fresh out of the oven was important, but I didn't realize how important. I also learned that when you are hyper-analyzing pizza there isn't just the variation between shop to shop, there is also variation from slice to slice out of the same pizza. And lastly, if you had asked me if I thought some of the best pizza in the tournament would be meatless, I would have thought you were crazy. But they were. And the DeFazio's smoked mozzarella/red pepper pizza was, in my opinion, Best In Show. I'm going to have to try and copy that one.

Thursday, October 9, 2014

The judging moved on to the “spicy” pizzas. We had already
sampled 4 large slices of pizza which was what we had been doing during Round
1. It was time to take a deep breath and double up because there were 4 more
slices to be eaten. And they were needed, at least for me because my scorecard
after the “Classic” round was essentially a dead heat.

5th and 50 Spicy: Chicken Parmesan Pizza

There’s no nice way to put this. This pie was everything I
didn’t like about 5th and 50 from the first round. The rim of the
crust was bready and tough. The rest of the crust acted as a stiff support to a
layer of topping mush. What sauce you could taste had a really nice level of
heat to it but the sauce had been absorbed into the rest of the topping of dry,
flavorless ricotta and what seemed like breading that had come off the chicken.
In looking around the room (not just the judges table), there were several
plates with a slice of this pizza missing one or two bites. That said, one of
the guests really liked it. I don’t think 5th and 50 makes it into
the Finals.

5th and 50 Spicy

Crust:2, Sauce:3, Toppings:1, Overall Taste:3, Total:9.

Marino’s Spicy: Hot Sausage and Pepperoni Pizza

Marino’s went meat. And plenty of it. The crust was nicely
browned but a little dense. The sauce was just ok and didn’t hold up to the
zing of the meats. It was there, but you’re not going to be eating this pizza
and think “mmm, delicious sauce” like on their Margherita. The heat of the
zippy pepperoni and spiced sausage just overpowered the sauce. The cheese had
good texture to it, but the flavor was also overpowered by the meats. The
pepperoni had good bite to it and I wonder if this is a spicier pepperoni than
their usual. This wasn’t pepperoni my kids would enjoy. The sausage was tasty
too. And there was plenty of meat. The slice had a real heft to it. If you are
into a spicy meat lovers kind of pizza, you will definitely enjoy this pie.

Marino’s Spicy

Crust:3, Sauce:3, Toppings:4, Overall Taste:6, Total:16.

Marissa’s Spicy: Chicken Caccitore Pizza

I have no idea how Marissa’s did it, but on the night of the
semi-finals, their crust traveled really well and was the closest to still
being in the shop. I liked the sauce. It had a really nice depth of flavor and
a slow burning spice/heat that came out after you were done with a bite. I
thought there was a strong under current of kalamata olives to the sauce. I
happen to like those olives, if you don’t I could see that as a turn off. The
fresh mozzarella got a little tough in transport but the braised, shredded
chicken was moist, tender and flavored by the sauce. I personally believe that
the idea/concept of this pizza is inspired. I’ve never heard of it being done.

Marissa’s Spicy

Crust:3, Sauce:4, Toppings:3, Overall Taste:7, Total:17.

DeFazio’s Spicy: Buffalo Chicken Pizza

After this scored so well in past Tournaments, I had to go
to the store and try it. And I enjoyed it. But tonight, something was off. The
crust had nice color to it but it was a little bready and dense. The sauce is
Franks Red Hot and there was a lot of it on this pie. I suppose that isn’t
really a bad thing, but everything on the slice tasted like Red Hot. The bites
of chicken were moist, tender and tasted good if you picked them off the slice.
Left on the slice, the chicken tasted like hot sauce. There was a little
gorgonzola flavor in the back and I could see that melted mozzarella cheese I
love, however the hot sauce was pretty much the only flavor. And it’s a shame
because I know this pizza can be better. After all, this is one of the highest
scoring pizzas in Tournament history, but not tonight. Any given pizza…on my
scorecard, Down Goes the Champ.

DeFazio’s Spicy

Crust:3, Sauce:2, Toppings:4, Overall Taste:5, Total:14.

Here’s how I scored the eight pizzas in the Final Four with
Marissa’s and Marino’s getting ready to fight it out for the title.

Classic

Spicy

Total

Marissa’s

18

17

35

Marino’s

17

16

33

DeFazio’s

17

14

31

5th and 50

15

9

24

This is how I scored it, but this is a panel of judges so my points are just a quarter of the points available to any individual pizza. Looking at the All Over Albany write up of the semi finals, it looks like the other judges didn't like the flavor of Marissa's tomatoes on their Margherita as much as I did and depending on the person, I could see the kalamata olives in the Caccitore pizza taking a hit. Also, keep in mind that when you are totally nitpicking everything on a pizza, there is even variation between slices from the same pie. The crust is a little different, toppings not quite the same, a little more/less sauce here and there. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I certainly see how Marissa's got bumped out. Hell, on my score sheet, it's only a 4 point spread between the top three shops.

And if you want to nerd out on some numbers, Greg has kindly posted all of the tournament scores in the annual Crunching the Numbers post at All Over Albany. If you take a look at those stats, DeFazio's has put up some serious numbers in the tournament. DeFazio's, Marino's and Marissa's have the highest all time averages. Seems fitting that it came down to those three shops. It will be interesting to see what happens at the Finals this Saturday.

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Last week on the pizza forum, someone in Arizona asked if there was anyone in the Northeast that would be willing to send him a bag of pizza flour. A lot of the flours used for pizza don't make it out west. Turns out that a Restaurant Depot here doesn't carry the same flours as a Restaurant Depot out there.

Putting my faith in the good will of pizza enthusiasts, I volunteered, totally confident that this complete stranger in Arizona would pay me back. I stopped by Restaurant Depot and picked up a 50 pound bag of flour (not quite $17), headed over to Staples and got a heavy duty box that would hold a 50 pound bag of flour (just over $5) and then went to the big UPS in Latham to ship it (just under $80). I honestly thought the shipping would be less. Apparently there is a surchage to send to Arizona. No idea why.

I sent the guy a message to let him know the flour was in the mail, tell him the cost and say $100 was close enough. He quickly replied that he had already received the tracking info and told me to watch my email for a PayPal transfer. Within minutes of letting him know the flour was in in transit, PayPal sent me an email letting me know $102 was just sent to me.

I spent the day pacing myself so I could be ready for the
Tournament Semi-Finals. Four shops each submitting two pizzas meant 8 slices
per judge. Basically an entire large pizza. I started the day with a yogurt and
banana. Had a peanut butter and jelly from Stewarts for lunch and then nothing
else until the judging started around 6:30. Many thanks to the people at Keeler Mini
for hosting and sponsoring these semi finals.

This tasting was kind of a sensory overload for me. Out of
the 8 pizzas sampled, only two were similar so there were 7 very different
kinds of pizza to eat. I think my note taking suffered during this tasting as I
was trying to wrap my head around how much different the to-go pizzas were from
the in-store pizzas. And there was just so much pizza. I didn’t step on a scale
the morning after this tasting. Ignorance is bliss.

The four semi finalists were asked to submit a pizza they
considered to be a “classic” and another they considered “spicy.” We started
with four slices of classic.

5th and 50
Classic: Greek Pizza

The pie was cooked on a screen (the only shop in the finals
using one) and my slice didn’t have a rim that easily pulled off. Maybe they
roll the rim of the pie over itself. The crust was nicely browned on the top
and bottom but a little oily toward the center of the pie. I though the crust
was bready and tough by itself but worked with the pizza. A significant
improvement, in my opinion, over their Round 1 pizzas. It was a white pizza so
there wasn’t really a sauce. As with the white broccoli pie, judges used the
flavors and extra cheese for the sauce score. The feta was fairly mild. Nothing
wrong with that, I’m not sure a strong feta would have worked well on this pie.
The feta was combined with diced bits of ham, or maybe mild bacon or maybe Canadian
bacon. I’m not sure which it was and while that is a little unsettling the
flavor combined with the tomato pieces was good. Not a great slice, but
certainly not a bad one.

5th and 50
Classic

Crust:3, Sauce:3,
Toppings:3, Overall Taste:6, Total:15.

Marino’s Classic:
Margherita Pizza

This was the slice where the difference between eating in
the store and getting takeout hit me. The crust that I had really enjoyed in
Round 1 still had good flavor but was tougher to chew. The color on the crust
was nicely browned but the toasty notes seemed to have gotten lost in transit.
The sauce though…I think this sauce was the best thing we tasted all night.
Really good tomato flavor with delicious chucks of tomato spread out over the
slice. What brand of tomatoes are they using? The cheese had a nice flavor but
it was a little tough/stringy. I’m not sure there is any way around that with a
fresher style of mozzarella being transported. While still a good slice here,
this would be great ordered and eaten at the restaurant.

Marino’s Classic

Crust:3, Sauce:5,
Toppings:3, Overall Taste:6, Total:17.

Marissa’s Classic:
Margherita Pizza

I don’t know how they did it, but the crust on the Marissa’s
Margherita travel better than the others. Definitely had more chew that when we
were in the store but it never got that cardboard-y texture some pizza crusts
get as the cool off. There was a very thin coating of sauce on the pizza but
the tomatoes on the slice, while not looking like they would taste good, did
taste good and really perked up the flavor on the slice. The freshly shredded
basil was nice too. The fresher mozzarella had browned in spots and became like
the Marino’s pie became tough/stringy but the flavor was nice. This slice
tasted a lot better than it looked.

Marissa’s Classic

Crust:4, Sauce:3,
Toppings:4, Overall Taste:7, Total:18.

Defazio’s Classic:
Sausage with Peppers and Onions Pizza

The crust had good color and a little bit of char on the
bottom. Once again, the impact of travel on the crust was clear. This crust
would have clearly been better in the shop. The sauce had a good tomato flavor.
The cheese was tender, flavorful/salty, and I still want to know the brand. The
sausage was also good and well seasoned. It had much less of that paprika
flavor that we had on their sausage pie in Round 1. Green peppers aren’t my
favorite (they aren’t ripe) and this pie had a strong green pepper flavor to
it, but it worked.

Defazio’s Classic

Crust:4, Sauce:3,
Toppings:4, Overall Taste:6, Total:17.

After the classic round of the Final Four, I had this scored
as pretty much a dead heat. In my mind at this point in the tasting, any of the
shops could make it to the Finals. There was a little bit more spread when all of the judges scores were counted, but it is still anyone's round to win. The All Over Albany summary of the classic round is here. While the judges and I may differ on opinion here and there, one thing that stands out from looking at the summary is the score for the Marino's Margherita. Their sauce scored a perfect 20, 5 out 5 from each judge. It was really good.

Friday, October 3, 2014

I put together a summary of my Round 1 scores. The only
outstanding misfire that I see is that Marino’s sausage pie should be higher
than Marissa’s and I’ve already mentioned that Marissa’s sausage pie should
have been a little lower. A rookie judge mistake. While I may have had doubts
when looking back at individual pizzas, I think the “Total” column is a good
ranking in how I felt about the shops and the pizza we were served.

Shop

Sausage

Broccoli

Total

DeFazio’s

21

19

40

Marino’s

18

20

38

Marissa’s

19

14

32

DC’s

13

16

29

Mario’s

13

11

24

I Love

12

12

24

Mama Mia’s

14

9

23

5th and 50

9

8

17

I think the “we were served” part of that last statement is
important and something that needs to be taken into consideration. These rankings
were based on two pizzas from 8 shops on random Thursday evenings. I’d argue
that each of these shops is capable of putting out better (or worse) pizza than
the pies we were served. One judge joked, “Any given Thursday” and there is a
lot of truth to that. I would, however, also argue that the likelihood of
getting a better pizza than what we were served improves the higher you go up
this list. And the pizza at Mama Mia’s is better than their score. I bet they
lost 6 or 7 points due to an unfortunate decision.

My top 4 shops can’t be the Final Four because two of them fought it out in a match up but my three highest scores all advanced to the semifinals. In
my overall scores, the two shops in Saratoga bracket finished 7th and
8th. The order of my rankings of Mama Mia's and 5th and 50 were overruled by the other judges and 5th
and 50 squeaked into the Final Four.

Some final thoughts on Round 1: Three of the top 4 ranked
shops on my list make their own sausage. I think that shows a certain level of
commitment to quality ingredients and that commitment comes through in the
product they sell. Only one of the shops in my top 4 uses screens. That’s a
different level of commitment to skill. In my mind, screens have more to do
with convenience and ease than quality. And the final weird thing I noticed
looking back at the Round 1 results is that half of the shops in the tournament start with
the letter M. I’m not sure what to make of that.

Thursday, October 2, 2014

I have no idea if there are still tickets available, but if you are interested in being a pizza judge, follow this link
to see if you can still get a now FREE ticket to the AOA Tournament of
Pizza Championship. This is going online a little late. The official
results for this pizza battle went up yesterday.

I have a little bit of history with DC’s but only one visit
to their shop. I thought their sausage was good, but the overall slice was
lacking. But that was then, this is now and we are judging the slice in front
of us. Starting with a slice of sausage pizza: The rim of the crust had a nice
depth of flavor but the rim was a little bready. There was no char on the
pizza, in fact the pizza was a little bit light in color, and the bottom had
plenty of screen markings. The sauce had a pasta sauce quality to it and I
think it would have been nice on some ziti. It would also work for pizza but
there was too much of it here. The cheese pretty much slid on the sauce and the
slice couldn’t support its own weight. The sausage was good, although I’d say
it was better at my last visit. All the components combined to make a very middle
of the road slice.

Sausage Pizza

Crust:2, Sauce:3,
Toppings:3, Overall Taste:5 for a total of 13 points.

Moving onto the broccoli slice, I was surprised at how
similar this crust was to the sausage pizza. I guess there is something to be
said about the consistency of a screen. The only noticeable difference (and it
is kind of a big one), was that without the tomato sauce, this slice was able
to support its own weight. The cheese and ricotta worked well together, the
ricotta was spread out nicely over the slice and I thought there was a nice
seasoning to the pie. The broccoli was minced, I’m guessing frozen but without
any large pieces there was no frozen broccoli texture. While I think I would
prefer florets, minced is probably the way to go if you are using frozen
broccoli.

Broccoli Pizza

Crust:3, Sauce:4,
Toppings:3, Overall Taste:6 for a total of 16 points.

Marissa’s in Guilderland

I have had pizza from Marissa’s twice. Once was a whole pie
to go (after a previous Tournament of Pizza) that was alright, but nothing that
made me excited to return to the shop. The other time was a lunchtime visit for
a slice when I was in the neighborhood. My takeaway from these two visits was
that Marissa’s pizza was significantly better when reheated as a slice. That
second cook really helped the crust out. I was looking forward to seeing how
their pizza was fresh out of the oven.

Sausage pie first: no screen and some nice color on the
bottom of the pie. The rim on my slice was a little pale but there were slices
on the pizza that had nice little brown bubbles on the crust. The crust was
surprisingly bland by itself but it worked well when combined with the flavors
of the sauce and cheese. The sauce had a nice flavor and there was a proper
amount of it on the pizza. The sausage was thinly sliced pieces a link sausage.
It had a good flavor but was not especially eye pleasing. All in all, I thought
the flavors combined nicely to make a good slice.

Sausage Pizza

Crust:4, Sauce:4,
Toppings:4, Overall Taste:7 for a total of 19 points.

Marissa’s broccoli pie: The crust was darker on the bottom
than it was on the top. There were some bubbles on the rim and the slice had a
crisp snap when I folded it to take a bite. The drops of ricotta were well
distributed but very plain and not seasoned. The broccoli was minced and very
similar to DC’s. There was a lot of garlic on the slice. A lot…of what I’m
guessing is purchased minced garlic. With fresh garlic and better ricotta, this
could have been a much better slice.

Broccoli Pizza

Crust:4, Sauce:2,
Toppings:3, Overall Taste:5 for a total of 14 points.

Analysis

In the days after this round, I really started second
guessing my scores. I still do. This judging is hard. With 20/20 hindsight, I
think I gave Marissa’s two points they might not have deserved. The toppings on
the sausage pie sausage should have been a 3 and I probably should have given
the toppings portion of the broccoli pie a 2. The crust at Marissa’s was bland
on its own but I thought worked well with the overall pizza. It would have been
nice to have a 3.5 scoring option there. With this 2 point adjustment and the
impossible 3.5 scores taken into consideration, my scores for these two shops
are even closer at 30 to 29 points with Marissa’s still on top. Based on these
four pizzas, that seems right to me. On this night, I think Marissa’s was a
little better than DC’s, but not by much. Almost a coin flip. I have spent a
lot of time hoping that the other judges also slightly preferred Marissa’s and
that these 2 or 3 points don’t impact the outcome of the tournament and luckily
they didn’t.

Again, my feeling was that the pizza we sampled at Marissa’s
was a little better than DC’s and the scores showed that on my scorecard (33 to
29). Looking at the total scores from all the judges for Marissa’s I gave the
sausage pie 19 out of its 74 points (26%) and the broccoli pie 14 out its 60
points (23%). At DC’s I gave the sausage pie 13 of its 57 points (23%) and the
broccoli pie 16 of its 67 points (24%). In a completely unscientific way, it
would appear that the other judges and I agree on this match up.

Round 1: Albany Wrap Up

In another surprise to me, I liked the broccoli pizza more
than the sausage pizza at DC’s. My main take away from the night was how
important the marriage of individual components in a pizza is. The Marissa’s
crust was a little bland, but got significantly better when combined with the
sauce and cheese. I think the quality of the DC’s sausage got pulled down by
their sauce. Too bad there isn’t a way to make a Franken-pizza combining the
best parts of both shops. It was a very close match up and probably goes back
to that “any given pizza” theory. Same pizzas ordered at a different time and
the outcome of this round could easily be different.

About Me

I've always be interested in cooking. I once thought about it as a career. In the end, I decided to go into bridge engineering and throw dinner parties whenever the mood struck. The hours are a little better.
For the past few years, pizza has been kind of an obsession.